


Permanence

by DemiraWatson (orphan_account)



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Boys Kissing, Dark, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Immortality, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-16
Updated: 2016-04-16
Packaged: 2018-06-02 16:11:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6573043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/DemiraWatson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“It’s terrifying isn’t it. The thought of dying. Nobody knows what’s on the other side of the door after all, nobody comes back.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Permanence

“Immortality…” Magnus starts, his voice trailing off as he struggles to define the condition that separates him and Alec. That’s caused this uncertainty at the beginning of their relationship. Like an unexpected step, it’s left them wrong footed and stumbling ahead. Alec doesn’t say anything, he deals in certainties and knowing the next move. It’s how he comes home alive, how he drags his siblings home alive. With everything that’s happened, Valentine and Jace, Clary and her mother, the wedding and his parents...Alec wants, no,  _ needs _ something that’s solid. Something certain and he desperately wants it to be Magnus. He wants Magnus to explain it, to make their future a little more concrete, a solid support he can lean on as everything else shifts and melts like sand dunes under his feet. So he won’t shy away from this, even if he wants to ignore it because right now they’re stalled and the only option is power through it or he has to go back and that...that just isn’t possible. Like trying to fit into an old suit, it just won’t work. He can’t go back. So he lets Magnus find the words, giving him the same patience that Magnus has always afforded him.

 

“Immortality is like standing in a big room with the same four blank walls with the same people forever and ever.” Magnus starts again, pacing the length of his living room slowly. A cocktail glass with a cloudy lilac liquid inside in one hand as his other waves around the air.  “At first it’s great fun, you explore the walls, you talk to the people and you learn so much. Eventually though you run out of words and stories to share with each other and there’s nothing else to explore.” 

 

He pauses in his steps, eyes downcast and distant before he shakes off whatever memory has pulled him away from the room. Magnus smiles at Alec and Alec smiles back, offering him some wordless comfort against the history weighing Magnus down. It seems to strengthen Magnus, his stance a little taller as he starts pacing again. Gestures loose again and his hand dancing through the air gracefully.  

 

“Now imagine if you will, there’s two doors on opposite walls and you have no idea what’s behind either one of them, it’s a mystery you can’t ever solve. And new people come in through one door and they stay for a while but they’re temporary, eventually they go through the other door and that’s it, no coming back. Understand?” Magnus checks and Alec nods, feeling a little like he’s back in a classroom. Except his hands are wrapped loosely around the thin stem of an alcoholic beverage and the chair he’s sunken into is far more comfortable than the wooden benches of his old classes. 

 

“These new people brings stories and words and ideas with them but they never stay. They’re unique in every way, some are good...others are bad.”  _ Like Valentine _ , Magnus doesn’t say but Alec hears in the steadying breath Magnus takes before he continues. Magnus holds his elbow close to his chest, the drink near enough to sip but he hasn’t since he snapped the two glasses into existence. “But no two are the same and they’re all so damn interesting. They’re just something brand new, in this stagnant little world.” Magnus smiles, close mouthed but warm. 

 

Alec opens his mouth to say he gets it, he understands. Even if he doesn’t like it, doesn’t like feeling temporary especially to Magnus but Magnus holds a finger up at him, stilling the words in his throat by some kind of magic that has nothing to do with his Warlock blood. 

 

“Now you can try and make them stay, force them to remain and sure that’s great for a little while but eventually they’ve turned into you, trapped in the same room and running out of words and then you realise that the reason you wanted to keep them in the first place, well,  you’ve killed that by making them stay.” Magnus adds, quieter than before. He’s stopped pacing, his gaze focused solely on Alec like the first night they had drinks together. There’s something tired and old in Magnus’ eyes and something else, something Alec’s not ready to identify. 

 

“There are a few options as an immortal. For instance, Camille. You can turn into her, you can grow bitter with the room and how permanent you are, hate the mortals.” Magnus explains, eyes growing dark and colder than they should be, locking away what makes him so warm and bright to Alec in defence against the current topic. Like Camille still has some kind of power lingering in the room that can strike out and hurt him if he doesn’t pull up walls around himself. Alec’s throat dries as he remembers Camille, so flippant in her approach to them, to their situation. SHe laughed at them, cared nothing for them. He tries to imagine it, how long would it take for someone to become  _ that _ . What she must've done to Magnus all those years ago that it can still affect him even now. He doesn’t like the answers, they all turn his stomach. “Of course they get to go through the door and you don’t. Jealousy is an ugly thing, it twists you into a monster, one that preys on the unsuspecting, the innocent. Camille grew to hate them, the mortals and so could any immortal. Maybe one day you could decide to hurt them, torture them for being temporary and make them feel some of your pain.” 

 

Alec feels the burn rise in his throat, the urge to gag. The thought that he could...that Magnus could...He takes a big gulp of his drink, the snap of magic tickling at his nose but it pushes the bile back down. He wants to say no, that they’d never do that. But...and there it is, the ‘but’. Just what turned Valentine into the monster he is? Why did his parents join the Circle to begin with? 

 

Something tells him that no matter all his good intentions in the world, there’s a dark part inside that could do that, could turn and spread like a cancer through him until he was as bad as everything he hunted. All it would need? Time. Alec shivers. Magnus clears his throat and just like that, the cold frost thats settled on them disappears. 

 

“You can ignore it all, hide in a corner and study the walls around you, try and figure out the mystery of the doors. Shut yourself off from everything like Ragnor... But that’s not good either.” Magnus mutters, his hold on himself growing tighter for a second at the mention of his old friend. The grief is still there, hidden under flowing colourful garments and glittering rings. His own armour holding him together. 

 

Alec sets his drink aside and stands, Magnus watches him. He doesn’t move towards Alec, he just waits. Alec wanders over, collecting the glass from Magnus’ limp hand and depositing it on a nearby table. He briefly winces at the idea of the cold glass leaving tracks of condensation against the expensive wood but he pushes it aside, turning back to Magnus to pull him gently into a hug. 

 

Magnus sighs into his chest as Alec rests his head on Magnus’, wrapping his arms tight around him. They stay there, silent and wrapped around one another as the sun disappears behind the New York skyline and the stars begin to glitter against the light of the city. Magnus pulls away, not far and his hands are still on Alec’s hips. His eyes are shut and his breath is slow and deep as he pulls himself back from the grief. 

 

When he opens his eyes again, it’s Magnus staring at him again, confident and sure, loose and warm. Magnus smiles, more of a smirk, a tease really. “I chose to dance with them, to care for them, even love them. Mortals are like snowflakes, unique and temporary but so damn beautiful. Sparkling and unpredictable, each and every one of them.” 

 

Alec smiles because Magnus’ voice is so full of wonder, he truly loves people, finds them interesting in a way that so few other immortals do and Alec thinks that’s half the problem with Shadowhunters. The Clave is insulted by how little they matter in the permanence of the immortals existence. 

 

But Magnus doesn’t look down on mortals, mundane or Shadowhunter. Magnus doesn’t look down on him or past him. He could of. Izzy and Jace alone are distracting in their beauty and personalities but Magnus had looked at him. Hadn’t stopped actually and Alec feels warmed by it. Temporary as he is, he’s important to Magnus. He’s always been Jace’s parabatai, Izzy and Max’s brother. He’s never just been Alexander until Magnus came along and then everybody else was a side effect to Alec. 

 

“And every now and then, one mortal comes along and changes the game.” Magnus whispers and Alec jolts. He can’t breathe, his lungs caught tight against his ribs. 

 

Magnus slips away from Alec’s grasp, like he knows the words alone are too heavy to bear alongside his hold. “It makes me question myself, what I would be willing to do. Because I want to keep them, to make them permanent like me. I want more time with them. For an immortal, there never seems to be enough time when you want it.” He laughs a little, the sound sad and empty. Magnus’ gaze is stuck on painting, unfocused and far away. His words when they come are cold, full of fear against himself. “Sometimes I feel like one of those people who pin butterflies to a board, keep them behind glass to view whenever they want and it makes me sick. Because part of what makes you...them beautiful is your mortality. If I kept them then I’d kill them, they’d become just like me. Trapped in a room, running out of stories and forced to watch as the mortals get to go through that door.”

 

Alec shivers, he can imagine it but it’s lost for a moment. He doesn’t miss the slip. Not  _ them _ , someone from Magnus’ past,  _ you _ . Magnus’ present. Him.

 

Alec swallows around the dry lump in his throat. His eyes drop to the floor. 

 

It feels wrong, to be elevated above and beyond a nameless footnote in Magnus’ history. They barely know each other and Alec has pride of place in Magnus’ heart. He’s special. Alec’s never been special. He’s never been wanted or worshipped like this. Viewed as anything more than an average Shadowhunter. But Magnus cuts away at that, see’s something else entirely and it’s thrilling. He makes Alec see something else in the mirror. It’s amazing and terrifying all at once, to have his perception of himself rewritten into something  _ more _ . But what happens if it’s a lie? What if Magnus leaves and Alec is left with this funhouse mirror version of himself that no longer fits. He doesn’t know what to do. Alec looks up, struggles to make a sound. 

 

Magnus smiles sadly at him, like he can hear all the words that Alec can’t say. “It’s not right but sometimes I want to keep you. Nobody comes back through that door, I know that. It’s not fair but it’s part of you.” Magnus ducks his head, suddenly at a loss for words or maybe frightened of them. Alec reaches out with one hand and catches Magnus’ hand. He weaves their fingers together.

 

Magnus looks up at him, his eyes warm and open capturing Alec’s gaze like headlights in the road. “Alexander you are unique and beautiful in so many ways and so many I haven’t gotten a chance to know yet, I could spend centuries with you and never get bored. I could spend an eternity with you and never find an end to the ways that you amaze me.” He whispers and Alec ducks down, crashes their lips together because it’s too much. It’s too damn much. Alec doesn’t feel worthy of any of it but he wants to be. He guides Magnus’ hand up to his neck, relishes in the soft scrape of Magnus’ painted nails up his scalp. He pulls Magnus closer, practically folds himself over him. His fingers clutching at Magnus just a little too tight as he slots their mouths together hard. Magnus gentles the kiss, petting at Alec’s hair and back, licking at Alec’s lips and pulling away just to brush their noses together leaving something aching in Alec’s chest. 

 

“But to keep you would be to kill you.” Magnus says against Alec’s lips, his voice cracking. “You wouldn’t become Camille, you’ve got to big a heart for that. You love more deeply, care more strongly than that. And that’s what would kill you. Because you couldn’t hide from the world like Ragnor, you’d have to involved. You would do anything to protect those you care about and they would grow old and die before your very eyes and it would break a piece of you to watch that. But you would still love...maybe their children and their grandchildren. And so on and so forth, it would chip away at you until you died. Maybe not in the physical sense but a soul death.”

 

Alec pushes their foreheads together. His jaw tight and eyes burning, he shuts them against Magnus’ words because he can see it, can see it all play out. All the years sweeping in and dragging his family away from him like the tide coming in. In and out it would go, leaving Alec on the cold shore to relive it with every passing day. 

 

“I can’t keep you but in the darkest part of my soul I want to.” Magnus confesses, the longing clear in his words and Alec knows, he could ask and Magnus wouldn’t have the strength to say no to him. Alec leans back in, kissing Magnus again but with a promise not to ask, to not put Magnus in that position. Magnus’ hands cup Alec’s cheeks, leaning into the kiss in thanks.

 

“But maybe...just maybe. I could go through the door with you. Maybe you’re the one I take that leap with. I don’t know.” Magnus rambles quietly, eyes shut, like he’s not even aware he’s speaking out loud. He chuckles, humorlessly. “It’s terrifying isn’t it. The thought of dying. Nobody knows what’s on the other side of the door after all, nobody comes back.”

 

Magnus licks his lips, his fingers digging into Alec’s face for a second. “I was there. When so many young frightened mortals would bang down Camille’s door. They begged to stay, they were so scared of what they didn’t know. It was like an infection, I saw Camille grow colder because of it and I felt it too.”

 

Magnus opens his eyes, the naked fear and wanting unguarded and plain in his eyes. “I’m scared too. Sometimes it freezes me, the idea of simply not being here anymore. But maybe I wouldn’t have to do it alone. I wasn’t lying Alexander. I don’t know what the future holds for us but I’ll cherish every second you give me.” 

 

Alec’s hand finds Magnus’, grasping at it but keeping it close to his face. His thumb rubs a line along the back of Magnus’ hand. It all floats above them, every promise and possible future, tethered like balloons and just beyond reach. All Alec has to do is look at them and he could see the paths ahead, see the messy break-ups or the meltdowns. The arguments and the sleepless nights apart. He could see the resentment growing and building, festering like an open wound until it poisons them both. The obstacles that threaten to pull them apart, the people who help keep them together. He could see the picnics, the world at their feet when they only have eyes for each other. The wedding and the children they give a home too. He could see the love and the goodbyes. 

 

But not one future is certain. 

 

Alec feels like he’s standing at the altar again, Magnus waiting down the aisle, waiting to be turned away or taken in but expecting to be turned away. He feels the want in his chest, not for the certainty but for something that’s purely his. Something he wants not for anybody else but for him. And once again, it’s Magnus. 

 

“It’s a good place to start.” Alec says quietly, his voice rough with disuse. Magnus smiles softly, he sighs as Alec rests their foreheads together, just basking in each other’s presence.

  
  



End file.
